Inspired by his experience of growing up in foster care, Emmanuel founded The Lighthouse, an organisation with a vision of radically improving education outcomes for children in care.

He is a former English teacher. He trained on the Teach First programme and taught in Birmingham for three years. Emmanuel has been developing the idea for Lighthouse since 2014 when he began conducting research into the educational experiences of looked after children. In 2018, he was awarded a Winston Churchill Fellowship to study children’s homes in Germany and Denmark, the results of which informed the Lighthouse model. Emmanuel is a graduate of the London School of Economics and also holds an MA in Education and Leadership from Warwick University.